Read Online Hidden Treasures by Judith Arnold - Free Book Online Page B

do about the items his father had stolen from him , not from his grandfather.
    She was still standing on her back porch, staring at him. He shoved himself to his feet and strode across the grass to the broken fence that separated their property. She wasn’t exactly frowning, which he took as encouragement to step over the fence slats. “How was school?”
    “Awful,” she told him. “Have you seen today’s Rockwell Gazette? ”
    He noticed an edition of the newspaper protruding from her tote. “I saw it,” he said with a smile. “We’re famous.”
    “I don’t want to be famous,” she announced, then pulled a key from her pocket and unlocked the backdoor. “I can’t believe how Meryl mangled Dr. Gilman’s name. He’s going to be upset about that.”
    “As if he actually reads the Rockwell Gazette .”
    He couldn’t tell if his sarcasm annoyed her until she glanced over her shoulder at him. Yeah, it annoyed her, but her eyes had laughter in them. “Maybe it would be best if I don’t mention the article to him.”
    “That would be my strategy.”
    She shoved open the door, which stuck a little around the molding—his grandfather should have taken care of that when he’d sold her the place—and didn’t try to prevent him from following her inside. A frantic beeping came from the telephone sitting on a counter. She tossed her tote onto a chair beside the small pine table near the window, crossed to the phone and pressed a button on the console. He realized it was an answering machine, and all those beeps—he lost count after five—were messages.
    “Hello, this is Doug Brezinski from the Boston Globe . I’m writing a piece about your archaeological find. I’ve already spoken with a Mr. Rideout, and I’d like to speak to you, too. My phone number…”
    “This is Sandy Bradburn from Channel 3 News in Manchester. I’m heading up to Rockwell today, and I’m hoping we can talk. I’ll call again when I get into town…”
    “I’m trying to reach a Ms. Leet-ner. My name is Malcolm Moody, and I’m a historian with the Minuteman Historical Society…”
    “Jeez Louise, Erica! How’d you get so friendly with Jed Willetz?”
    Erica slammed the off button to silence her messages.
    “Hey, who was that?” he asked, pretending enormous interest. “It sounded a little like Janelle Dickerson.” He’d gone to high school with Janelle. He’d gone the distance with her, too. She’d been quite the party girl back then. Last he heard, she was working behind the counter at Rockwell Rx, keeping tabs on who in town was taking which drug.
    “It wasn’t,” Erica said swiftly. Then she sighed. “She’s Janelle Mondo now.”
    “No kidding? She married Danny Mondo?” He flipped a chair around and straddled it. “When did that happen?”
    “It was rather sudden. She was pregnant.” She bit her lip and turned away, her cheeks flushing pink. “I shouldn’t have said that. It’s only gossip.”
    He grinned. He liked her qualms, even though they were misplaced. Everyone knew everything about everyone in Rockwell. The only reason he hadn’t known about Janelle was that he no longer lived in town.
    She turned back to Jed, her cheeks still bright with color but her eyes steady. “Did you get lots of calls like these?” she asked, gesturing toward her answering machine.
    He shook his head. “I haven’t got a phone. Well, I’ve got my cell phone with me, but nothing hooked up at my grandfather’s house. No number people from the Boston Globe could look up in the directory.” He pondered the other messages he’d overheard, even though he’d much rather contemplate Janelle’s insinuation about him and Erica getting friendly. “It looks like you really are famous.”
    “It’s ridiculous. Why would the Globe want to write a story about an old box I dug out of my garden?”
    “Maybe because you’re from Boston?”
    She frowned. “I’m not. Technically. I’m from Brookline, which is a large suburb